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Nogai-class Heavy Frigate
The Nogai-class Heavy Frigate was built by the Baikonur Stellar Initiative, or BSI, in response to the Aggressor II-class Heavy Frigate. Ace Energy and Xiaozhu Interstellar were major contributors to the project to build such a warship. Its namesake is the Nogai Khanate which ruled the Caspian coast of Kazakhstan, the home country of BSI, in medieval times. The Nogais were the primary warship of the Market Coalition Trade Guild, and thus a direct counterpart to the aforementioned Aggressor II of the Earth Partnership as well as the contemporary Vindicator-class Heavy Frigate used by the Profit Communion powers. The Nogai was comparable to the Aggressor II in capabilities, despite taking the opposite approach in most crucial design decisions. Armament BSI lacked the qualities of ATOS to develop powerful laser systems for the warship's armament, instead settling for the Ronstal designs which featured a higher rate of fire than the weapons in use by ATOS. For every 4 shots fired by one of the Aggressor II's fusion laser cannons (at normal rate, without risking overheating), the Nogai could fire 5. This was further strengthened by the expertise of Xiaozhu Interstellar, BSI's other trade guild partner, which fitted the Nogai-class with the most powerful rangefinder computers available at that time. This meant that the Nogai had superior accuracy to the Aggressor II as well. The higher rate of fire, combined with greater accuracy, meant that Nogai warships had comparable or even superior firepower compared to the Aggressor II, despite the latter having more weapons overall. Ace Energy was also a significant contributor here, producing more efficient fusion reactors for use on the Nogai, mostly in the form of advanced cooling systems which reduced the risk of overheating - allowing the Nogai to channel additional energy for a short burst of heavy laser fire. Armour and structure The Nogai was the most well-armoured heavy frigate of its time, however the armour was the most expensive part of the ship to construct. This is unusual for a starship; normally the most expensive component is the warp drive. The Atmospheric Layer was especially resistant to physical wear and tear by comparison to its rivals. The Ablative Armour consisted of corrugated, interlocking silicon crystals, coated with a thin layer of reflective lining. Taken together, the ablative layer was capable of absorbing up to 45 to 55 percent of the heat energy of an incoming laser blast and transfer it to the ship's powerplant, and would reflect low to medium-power laser beams on average once in ten times. Finally, this was all superimposed over Heavy Armour constructed out of Neutronium and supported by a Graphene Structural Layer. The silicon needed for the crystals produced the best results for energy absorption, but silicates of high enough quality and the refining and manufacturing process to form them into structures suitable for armour plating meant that the ablative plating was extremely expensive - however very effective. To cut costs, the Nogai's competitors made use of less efficient copper-iridium plates instead, which were at best only about 1/3 as efficient at diffusing the energy of a laser blast. Of course the most expensive part of the armour was the Neutronium core. As Matter Compression techniques were extremely energy-expensive with human technology at this time, most of the required neutronium had to be bought from the Despertun. Securing and monopolizing trade with the Despertun became a central part of Market Coalition policy, in order to be able to mass-produce Nogais in sufficient numbers to match the fleets of Aggressor IIs and Vindicators it would be facing. In case neutronium supplies were cut off somehow, a variant of the Nogai existed that replaced the neutronium with the more common titanium-vanadium hulls, which were much weaker but also much cheaper. These saw limited usage. Despite the costly nature of the ship's armour, the reputation for invincibility the Nogai earned drew a lot of love from its captains and crews, and admiration from its enemies. In one engagement, a surrounded Nogai frigate survived in excess of 5000 laser hits, and was still fighting. Warp drive BSI had lead the way in superluminal engineering since its inception as a Mega-conglomerate. The elaborate fine-tunings, optimizations, and to some extent overclocking meant that the Nogai was capable of traveling at about 3300C during warp - 10% faster than the warp drives in use by rivals. The difference may seem small, however over long distances this significantly reduces travel times, allowing reinforcements to arrive days or even weeks sooner than would be expected from Acteon or Tritach. It also means that damaged warships can get to a repair station that much quicker, and be back in the fight that much sooner. Over time, these small advantages add up to a lot, lending the Market Coalition the strategic initiative in many large-scale conflicts. Energy resources and engines The engines were left to Ace Energy. Initial prototypes were delayed due to some debate between Ace engineers whether the warship should take Q-thrusters or Ionic ones. Methanol engines were not considered as Ace wanted to ensure the Nogai would make use of their latest reactor model, thus ensuring it has a market share, in addition Market Coalition strategists at the time considered it impractical to maintain the logistics network necessary to replenish warships' fuel tanks with methanol. As the armour was already extensive and costly to manufacture, Ace engineers wanted to cut costs by deploying the starship with quantum thrusters. These provided much less thrust than ionic or methanol engines, but do not require energy to be diverted from the ship's power-plants or for the ship to carry around large tanks of methanol fuel or helium-3. In the end, the committee in charge of the R&D program elected that there would be no compromise in the warship's engine power. Category:Starships Category:Heavy frigates Category:BSI ships